Boris Johnson draws on Lord of the Rings as he suggests he will return to
London in 2020 to help bring in a low-emissions zone

Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, has compared himself to Gandalf, the fictional wizard, and suggested that by 2020 he will have transformed into "some new form, more powerful than I can possibly imagine".

During an appearance before the Greater London Authority, Mr Johnson was challenged over his plans for a low-emissions zone, which will not be introduced in the capital until the end of the next Parliament.

He replied: "In one form or another I will be here. Like Gandalf I will be I will be translated into some new form, more powerful than I can possibly imagine. I will be here and we will make sure that under the ultra-low emissions zone there will be no bus that goes through town that is not a hybrid with very low emissions."

Gandalf is the fictional wizard in Lord of Rings novels by J. R. R. Tolkien, who is initially known as Gandalf the Grey but returns from death as Gandalf the White, who is a significantly more powerful figure.

Mr Johnson, who is tipped as a future Conservative leader, made the comments during a series of exchanges with Baroness Jones, the Green peer, at a meeting of the London Assembly.

Related Articles

Miss Jones criticised the Mayor of London over previous comments in which he suggested that London's air is so clean that children should be bussed in from Norfolk to breath it.

She said: "That doesn't quite fit with illegal levels of air pollution that surround many of our schools, caused primarily by TfL's dirty buses. Where is it in you Budget that says you're going to have clean buses."

Mr Johnson "There was a recent bad air day across the whole of the UK when the air quality in Norfolk was worse than it is in London. We have seen substantial improvements in our air quality."

Miss Jones said claimed he had repeatedly "fiddled the figures" on air quality, a claim Mr Johnson said was "absolutely untrue".

Miss Jones subsequently accused him of talking "rubbish", to which Mr Johnson responded: "No you talk rubbish. I recycle rubbish, I dispose of rubbish. We get rid of it. We use it to create clean, green renewable energy."